SPECIAL TOPIC: Meng Liansheng's Library and Information Academic Thought and Practice Innovation

Do Social Media Users Consent to the Use of Their Social Media Data in Research?——Ethical Reflection Based on User Acceptance Intention

  • Chen Yi ,
  • Li Si
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  • 1 School of Information Management, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072;
    2 Department of information management, Peking University, Beijing 100871

Received date: 2020-12-22

  Revised date: 2021-05-08

  Online published: 2021-08-07

Abstract

[Purpose/significance] This study takes social media users as the research object, investigates their acceptance intention for their own social media data collected for research, explores the influence of familiarity, trust and altruism on acceptance intention, analyzes the necessity of informed consent procedure, and reminds scholars to conduct ethical reflection. It provides a reference for establishing ethical norms for social media data research and conducting ethical risk communication with users. [Method/process] The psychological mechanism model of users from informed to consent was established. A total of 320 valid questionnaires were collected from Sina Microblog by questionnaire survey method, and the model was verified. [Result/conclusion] This study verifies two effective psychological paths: familiarity-altruism-acceptance intention and familiarity-trust-altruism-acceptance intention. It is found that familiarity and altruism are important factors that affect user acceptance intention. Users have strong ethical needs, and informed consent procedure is necessary. Researchers can also actively express respect and recognition, and enhance users’ altruism and acceptance intention to avoid ethical risks in the research process.

Cite this article

Chen Yi , Li Si . Do Social Media Users Consent to the Use of Their Social Media Data in Research?——Ethical Reflection Based on User Acceptance Intention[J]. Library and Information Service, 2021 , 65(15) : 120 -129 . DOI: 10.13266/j.issn.0252-3116.2021.15.014

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